29 Graduate Programs in Robotics part5 United Kingdom
Description
This article is from the Robotics FAQ, by Kevin Dowling nivek@cs.cmu.edu with numerous contributions by others.
29 Graduate Programs in Robotics part5 United Kingdom
Edinburgh University
Department of Artificial Intelligence,
5, Forrest Hill,
Edinburgh
EH1 2QL
Scotland
The Department of Artificial Intelligence has robot and vision groups
within it.
Main interests of the robotics group include:
* behaviour-based control of robots (both mobiles and arms)
* hybrid control -- symbolic planning and behaviour-based actions
* learning, both reinforcement and other types implementations of
biological systems eg cricket ears; vertebrate learning models
* active vision
* real-time control
* long survival times
* direct-drive arm control
As well as PhDs by research, the Department offers a one-year, taught,
modular, Masters course in Information Technology for Knowledge-based
Systems where one of the possible specialisations is in robotics and
vision. This course is designed for people without specific AI
background. One module involves the Masters students building and
programming their own robot out of Lego and supplied electronics.
Another module gives hands-on experience with a simple robot arm.
Contact the Admissions Secretary Judith Gordon for information about
courses.
"Principal Researchers"
* John Hallam
autonomous mobiles and survival
* Bob Fisher
vision
* Chris Malcolm
assembly robotics and hybrid systems
* Gillian Hayes
active vision and biological control
University of Birmingham
Birmingham, England
See [71]School of Computer Science
University of Essex
"Brooker Laboratory for Intelligent Embedded Systems"
email: robots@essex.ac.uk
Main interests of the laboratory:
* Behavior-Based Architectures (software and hardware)
* Active Vision
* Collaborative AI (ie multiple agents)
* Fuzzy and Neural Systems
* Virtual Systems (eg robot simulation and telepresence)
* Planning & Learning
* Reliable Robots (ie for inaccessible or hazardous environments)
"Principal Researchers:"
* Victor Callaghan
* Paul Chernett
behavior-based architectures, virtual systems and active vision
* Libor Spacek
active vision and face recognition
* Jim Doran
Collaborative AI
* Chang Wang
fuzzy and neural systems
* Edward Tsang & Sam Steel
planning & learning
* John Standeven &
* Martin Colley
reliable robotic systems
In addition to PhDs by research, there is a one-year, taught, Masters
course in Computer Science where it is possible to undertake robotics,
AI or vision.
Contact csdept@essex.ac.uk for further details of courses or
robots@essex.ac.uk for information on research. In addition some
useful information on the laboratory can be obtained at
[72]ftp://ftp.essex.ac.uk/pub/robots/SXlab.ps.Z
University of the West of England at Bristol
(used to be Bristol Polytechnic)
Undergraduate Robotics is taught as part of undergraduate programs in
engineering courses and as part of a real time computing course. The
engineering department has in its teaching labs Puma, Adept, IBM,
Cincinatti-Milacron and Funac robots.
"Intelligent Autonomous Systems group"
* Yichuang Jin, Will Wray
Neural net control of manipulators, especially stability-based
adaptive control. Comparative modelling of neurocontroller design
for robotics.
* Lawrence Bull, Owen Holland, Chris Melhuish
Behaviour-based mobile robots, collective behaviour, reinforcement
learning and genetic algorithms.
"Intelligent Flexible Assembly Technology (InFACT/ALASCA Group):"
Eureka/FAMOS Projects (EC colaborative project - academic and
Industry) The group has a large gantry based robot designed and built
by the group.
* Farid Dialami, Alan Redford
Advanced Large scale flexible assembly (Peugot cars etc), generic
tooling.
* David Eastlake (hardware), Mike Morgan(software)
Transputer based robot control of co-operating manipulators.
Email:
Bristol University
"Faculty"
Mr Khodlebandelhoo
* Bi arm research
* Path planning for redundant robots
* Wall climbing robots
Hull University
"Faculty"
Prof Alan Pugh
* Garment Manufacturing
* Arm/controller design
University of Manchester
"Department of Computer Science"
The web page below describes research in mobile robotics in the areas
of autonomous competence acquisition, learning by tuition and
navigation. Papers are also available at this site.
[73]http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/robotics
University of Oxford
"Robotics Research Group"
The Robotics Group currently comprises about seventy academics,
postdoctoral research staff, overseas visitors, and graduate students.
A broad range of topics in advanced robotics is studied in
collaboration with industry and government establishments throughout
Europe.
* Robot Design and Control
A number of projects are concerned with the design and control of
compliant robot arms.
* Parallel Architectures
Real-time sensor-based control of systems such as robot vehicles
is a topic of increasing interest. For low bandwidth sensors such
sonar, the emphasis is on Transputer architectures. For high
bandwidth sensors such as vision, hybrid SIMD/MIMD architectures
are being developed. A rapidly growing effort is concerned with
the design, implementation, and application of neural networks.
Digital and hybrid digital/analog chips have been designed and are
being fabricated. Algorithms and TTL circuits have been
constructed for text-to-speech synthesis.
* Vision and Active Vision
The theory and applications of vision accounts for approximately
one-third of the laboratory's effort. Current projects include
edge detection and texture segmentation and the computation of
visual motion by a parallel algorithm that estimates the optic
flow field.
* Sensors and Sensor Integration
Includes laser rangefinder development in addition to analog and
digital sonar sensors, as well as infrared rangers, have been
developed for the AGV project (below).
* Autonomous Guided Vehicles
Work on a research prototype of a fielded industrial AGV cuts
across many of the separate themes of the laboratory's work. The
goal of the initial project is to equip the AGV with sonar,
infrared, laser ranging, trinocular stereo, and model-based vision
sensors to enable it to avoid unexpected obstacles and to locate
pallets.
Reading University
"Faculty"
* Prof Kevin Warwick
Using neural nets in robotics and novel control algorithms.
Salford University
[74]http://WWW.salford.ac.uk/ or robotics work more directly at:
[75]http://WWW.salford.ac.uk/docs/depts/eee/homepage.html "Faculty"
* Dr D.P.Barnes, Dept. Of Electrical and Electronic Engineering,
Mobile Robots Research Group.
Autonomous mobile robot system with a behaviour-based architecture
are designed and built with the intent to study the processes of
cooperation with and without communication. Such an approach has
led us up a number of paths with present work in behaviour
synthesis and evolutionary robotics. Expertise in: Robotics,
Sensors, Communication, Connectionist Systems, Genetic Algorithms
and Genetic Programming. Possible studies in PhD and MSc work and
courses at undergraduate level.
* Ruth Aylett, Information Technology Institute
Robot planning systems, multi-agent systems, robot architectures,
hybrid behavioural/symbolic robots
* Dr D.Caldwell, Dept Of Electrical and Electronic Engineering.
Multi-Functional Tactile Sensing and Feedback (Tele-taction)
Tele-presence of an operator with a full mobile robot with two
manipulator arms, stereo vision and sound. Tactile sensing
datagloves are used to control the manipulators and video camera
is used to move head. Expertise: Manipulators, Sensors,
Tele-presence. Possible studies at PhD and MSc and courses at
undergraduate level.
Dr Francis Nagy
Speech Control of a Puma-560, Control of an 'Inverted Pendulum',
Miniature tactile sensors "Advanced Robotics Research Centre"
* Ultrasonic wrist sensor for collision avoidance
* Controller design
* Stereo Vision
University of Surrey
Mechatronic Systems and Robotics Research Group "Faculty"
* Prof G A Parker (g.parker@surrey.ac.uk)
* John Pretlove (j.pretlove@surrey.ac.uk)
Primary Areas of Research activity:
* 3D co-ordinate tracking system for robot metrology
* Neural networks and expert systems for vision and inspection
* Active stereo vision for real-time robot arm guidance
* Design of controllable stereo vision systems.
* Open architecture Puma controller
* Mobile robots
* We also offer MSc courses and undergraduate courses in automation,
* control, mechanical engineering and CIM.
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